Godden, a nurse at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, and nine other British nurses toured the Lehigh County facility yesterday as part of the first nursing exchange program between Buckinghamshire College in England and Kutztown University. The nurses visited the Reading Rehabilitation Center on Wednesday and will be touring St. Joseph's Hospital today.

The program is for practicing nurses working toward their baccalaureate degrees in England and at Kutztown.

Linda Goldberg, chairwoman of the Kutztown department of nursing, developed the program following two years of research and proposals.

"It gives nurses the opportunity to share different philosophies and to learn the values of each system," Goldberg said.

England's system of socialized medicine makes money for equipment and research difficult to obtain. Sally Wallis, a nurse at Harefield Hospital in Middlesex, said the differences between English health-care facilities and American hospitals were obvious.

"American hospitals are bigger than ours," Wallis said.

Smaller work areas and fewer medical advances make nursing and care procedures in Britain even more critical to the everyday operation of the hospital.

"It is very stressful," Godden said.

Sullivan cited different-sized tubes and connecting devices as variables between English and American systems.

Holistic care procedures are similar between the two countries, however.

"We approach patients the exact same way," said Kathleen Sullivan, head nurse in the LVH open heart unit. "Philosophically, we're right there."

While instruments and tools vary, the method of treatment is often the same. Sullivan said a nurse's approach to each individual case may determine the patient's recovery rate.

"Whatever the patient needs, we try to get for them," she said.

Some patients require a more personal touch. The hospital arranged for one patient to see his dog once he began to recover, she said.

The constant threat of AIDS in the American health industry extends to England as well. Godden said cases of hepatitis in England caused health officials to take precautions with blood disposal even before the AIDS virus took hold. Once AIDS became prevalent, nurses' attire included face mask, body suit and head covering.

"It was terrible for the patient," Godden said. "A lot of our care was based on ignorance."